


Memories

by SourWolf



Series: Lessons Learned [5]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-30
Updated: 2012-03-30
Packaged: 2017-11-02 17:56:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/371755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SourWolf/pseuds/SourWolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Scott's angry that he didn't get the cure but still does Stiles a favor, Derek is annoyed with the whole thing when he's not being haunted by anniversary of the fire, and Stiles is as excitable as ever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memories

When all was said and done, I was alone again. I had survived multiple times. Laura and I had missed the fire because of school. I had lived because Laura wanted me to stay in New York rather than go back to Beacon Hills with her. At the school, I had lived only because the alpha was more interested in luring Scott than he had been in finishing me off. Twice, I had been saved by Scott and Stiles’ efforts. Why had the others been taken so easily whereas I was left even after my purpose was complete?

Kate, the woman that seduced me and plotted the deaths of me and my entire family, was dead along with my own uncle, driven so strongly by his thirst for revenge that he was ready to kill even his own family to reach his goals. Peter believed he was avenging the family by destroying the people that were responsible for the fire and the corrupted investigation that followed. While I did feel justice was done, the only real justice was to finish the people that had directly harmed my family. Uncle Peter killed Laura. I couldn’t let Scott finish him just because there was a chance that he would be cured. I promised them justice and I had to deliver it. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself had I submitted that right to anyone else for something that might not have even happened, and that was assuming I could ever find a way to live with myself now that I had been left alive for whatever reason.

Of one thing I was certain: I was right not to let Scott finish Peter. The number of reasons, selfish and selfless, was staggering. Scott may not have been cured. Had he not been cured, he would have taken the position of alpha. Scott wouldn’t make it as an alpha. Alphas are the most powerful of our kind, and as such, they are never truly safe. Rogues constantly seek out alphas to try to take their place. Existing alphas will happily kill another alpha to further their territory, an event that is often followed by the culling of blood relatives, mates, and anyone loyal to the old alpha. Hunters inevitably blame alphas for nearly every crime that passes through their territory no matter how outlandish the connections may be. How would killing a man that was angry only because his family had been burned alive around him have affected the teenager’s already fragile mental state? How would Allison’s family – as bad a decision as I still thought that was – feel about Scott after they found him standing over a dead body with the alpha coursing underneath his skin? How would he be able to handle his newfound powers given that he barely had a hold on his powers as a beta? I had only ever heard of a single alpha that was bitten.

It was a story from long ago – one of the old stories Uncle Peter loved to tell. In a time of desperation, an alpha’s pack was under siege by Hunters. In his desperation, he went to a nearby garrison and turned the soldier in charge of its operations. It was successful at first, the Hunters were repelled as soldiers joined the werewolves on the battlefield. But the peace the victory brought didn’t last. The sergeant-major soon became hungry for power. He tried biting his soldiers only to watch the bites fester and his soldiers die. The sergeant realized that he needed the alpha to turn anyone, so he plotted to take down the alpha. His coup was successful and he began amassing a werewolf army, stopped only by the fact that Hunters had infiltrated the military to find the root of their losses in the earlier battles. The Hunters discovered the perversation of their homelands and killed the alpha before they laced the entire garrison with wolfsbane and set the place on fire. The wolfsbane supposedly allowed many humans to escape the ensuing inferno, but in truth, the number of werewolves and humans killed that day were probably equivalent.

The sergeant from the story was a power-hungry man who was very different from Scott, but what if the alpha was a corrupting force? What if it was really what cemented my uncle’s descent into madness? Perhaps my sister and father were just a little better at resisting it than most. Scott could barely control himself as a beta, would he really be able to handle being an alpha? The sheer animal nature of the alpha was overwhelming even to me at times, and I had been trained to one day take the role of the alpha of my pack.

The selfish reasons were no less numerable. I was tired of having no control. I couldn’t save my family, I couldn’t deny Laura’s will to come to Beacon Hills alone and I couldn’t save her, I couldn’t even stop a stupid teenager from making the same mistakes as me. As an alpha, I finally had more control, and maybe it would be enough. And Peter was my family. He had killed my sister. If anyone had any right to kill him, it was me.

Now, I was just tired. Even though it had been days since I had become the alpha, I still hadn’t gotten to sleep. In part, it was due to the alpha testing out my body. It gave me an itch to run, to hunt, to experience all the new things that we could do together now that it had the body of a true alpha werewolf to move within. I gave in to it for days, letting the animal take over so that I wouldn’t have to think, wouldn’t have to face the truths that were never going to stop waiting for me.

Finally, the wolf was sated for a little while and I was left with nothing to do but go back to my house. That was well enough until I happened to finally turn my cell phone back on after all this time. I turned it off after I found my sister’s body, knowing that as long as it was on, there was a chance someone could be watching my every move – a fact that did come in handy thanks to Stiles’ cleverness.

The first thing I saw on my phone was the time and date. It was eleven forty-nine on the morning of December sixteenth. It was a school day years ago when Laura and I had left home to head to school. Christmas break would have started that Friday for us. Much of our family was already in town, staying with us to celebrate Christmas where they would remain until the Wolf Moon celebrations ended a few weeks later. That was what Laura and I had been looking forward to when we left, at least. Our hopes were only met with a blazing inferno that claimed nearly the entire family.

How had I missed the fact that the anniversary was so close? Laura always made it a point to make us do something fun to keep our minds off of it. I always let her pick what we would do. Fun hadn’t exactly been in my vocabulary for nearly a decade now. I just went with whatever she wanted and did my best to make it look entertaining for myself. Once, she decided we’d go kayaking and spent the entire day trolling in the Atlantic waters until we had tired ourselves out so thoroughly that we got back to our beds, crawled in and slept through dinner, breakfast, and finally woke up around lunch the next day sore and starving. The one and only concert that I ever went to was an anniversary. A woman came and tried to flirt with me, but ended up having a conversation with me about how protective I was of my sister until I excused myself and punched a man in the face for refusing to leave her alone when she asked him to go away. The band Laura wanted to see had already performed so she pulled me out before I had the chance to do any more damage.

I realized my eyes were burning painfully. I rubbed at them and realized that somewhere along the course of my memories tears started to fall down my face. For once, I didn’t fight it. I allowed the emotions to finally play out as I sat with my back against a tree. My eyes were locked on the ash-gray eyes of the Hale home. My home. I felt as though I were looking at Peter before he had woken from his coma. The eyes I stared into belonged to an empty shell. The house was once full of life, and was so alive itself that it seemed it would never die. Yet now, it lay abandoned except for the last broken bit of life that had limped home to it. Soon, it and I would both collapse into the dust and emptiness that our old lives had left behind.

What happened to a soul subjected to a strengthening vacuum with each passing year? Would it collapse in on itself and form a black hole that would swallow it and everything surrounding it? Is that was this horrible feeling in my stomach was? How had I pushed this away for so long? This terrible, leaden emptiness seemed as though it would drink the air from my lungs, pull me into the very earth and bury me alive. This was a pain unlike any other I had experienced. The drive that kept me going was dead. There was nothing left but to sit here and truly let it settle in that nothing would ever be the same. I lost my family and my home and nothing would ever bring them back. I could suffer an eternity in the lowest circles of Hell and never deserve to see them again after the things I had done. I was truly alone.

I stood when I noticed the sound of Scott’s bicycle approaching me. I wiped the moisture from my eyes, making sure to simply look tired and angry as I took my usual tensed stance. His bike skidded to a stop and he climbed off of it.

“Hey.” He said gruffly, looking angry that he even came.

“What are you doing here?” I asked with a furrowed brow.

Scott forced a small box against my chest. “Stiles said I had to give you this. You’re coming to our Christmas party. Lydia’s parents will be out of town so Allison agreed to take care of her. Stiles and I’m guessing Jackson and Danny are coming. We’re doing secret santa. Stiles decided that you have Allison. Be sure to get her something good. I don’t care if you don’t like her. You owe me.” He growled, glaring up at me and flashing his golden eyes at me.

I met the glare with a crimson stare of my own and eventually Scott backed down. He growled and shook his head as he picked his bike with a rough jerk.

“You’re going to break it if you aren’t more careful.” I offered, knowing that I was source of Scott’s anger for not giving him what he assumed was a cure. He never listened to me when it came to anything else. The one time he listened and assumed that I have an infallible knowledge, it was about something that I seriously doubted about and only really said because I knew it would push Scott to side with me.

“Thanks.” Scott spat, rolling his eyes at me. “You better be there. I don’t want Stiles and Allison thinking I lied about telling you. I don’t know why they’re so dead set on having you around anyway.” With that, Scott climbed on his bike and left.

I let my senses trail after my beta until he was finally lost in the noise of town. I wasn’t even aware I had done it until I felt a sense of contentment spread through my body as my wolf became confident that my beta had gotten home and was safe from harm.

I looked down, wondering why there was a weight in my hands. Stiles said I had to give you this, Scott’s words came back to mind. I found a note attached to the package:

Derek, sorry this is late. With the alpha and you getting captured and the insanity and the three of us almost dying repeatedly and everything time kind of got away from me. So yeah… Happy belated birthday. Stiles.

I held the folded leaf of white printer paper that had been unceremoniously taped to the gift, staring curiously at Stiles’ script. He wrote like a young boy. His letters were roughly pieced together as though he still struggled to remember how to construct them. I could see the boy I met at the funeral scribbling words on the paper, striving to please his mother as she sat running her fingers through her son’s long hair. He finished the note and proudly showed his mother, brown eyes bright with hope that turned to happiness as she gave her approval. Even now, his handwriting remained unchanged, a small way to hold onto the memory of his mother who taught him how to form words, likely in speech as well as in writing.

I moved into the house’s gaping mouth and approached the charred mantel. The fireplace had once been the center point of our living room, which had in turn acted as the cent gathering point of the house. I placed the note on the building’s heart of hearts amid the layers of dust and ash and felt as the house gasped the breath of a drowned man trying to work air back into his lungs. Somehow, even act of kindness even this small made being in this house so much easier, as though it saw that maybe it didn’t have to be a tomb destined one day to fall to pieces like the family that had once inhabited it. I almost felt bad for giving it this false hope, for letting the thought cross my mind that it was anything more than a bit of pity.

Carefully, I unwrapped the package, being sure to cause no tears in the paper that I placed next to the note. Inside was a notecard with more of the same handwriting. I read it before taking a good look at what I could tell was a picture frame. I shook away the image of a frame decorated with paw prints holding a picture of Scott with a note that read something along the lines of ‘Congratulations on the new puppy!’ I would be killing Stiles later if that were the case. Or maybe I’d give the “gift” to Scott and let him punish his best friend for me.

Okay so this is super awkward but I know you wouldn’t be getting anything for your birthday and that just didn’t seem right so I had to get you something because, really, it’s your birthday. Everyone should get something for their birthday. Plus, Scott and I happened to meet this doctor guy that had this and it didn’t seem fair that he should get something like this when you lost just about everything in the fire. I know I would have wanted a picture of my mom if I knew someone else had one because that belongs with me and my dad not some random dude with a weird obsession. Anyway, I really really really hope you don’t kill me or something for this. I like my life and my body parts right where they are.

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. The boy didn’t even know how to shut up when he was writing. I put the note with the other one and nonchalantly flipped the frame over. I was so easily distracted by Stiles’ rambling I managed to pass over the obvious hints at what I should expect. I was so shocked to see the picture that I nearly dropped it. The frame was saved only by the fact that I consciously forced myself to tighten my hold.

The frame was aluminum, the top left corner cut out in a circular shape to represent the moon. In the bottom right, a lone wolf howled up at the moon. But my eyes lingered on the painfully symbolic frame for only a moment. In the frame was a picture of my smiling mother. I sat in the background, my eyes trained in the same direction as my mother’s. I remembered this picture being taken. I hadn’t really thought I was in frame when it was taken. My mother had been shot by a Hunter while we were out on a run. The arrow that embedded itself into her skin threatened to splinter if we pulled it out so we went to a doctor that we felt we could trust. He had been absolutely enthralled by my mother and the way that she healed. Despite his eager questions, my mother insisted that he would be safer if he knew as little as possible, but did agree to let the doctor have a picture of her so that he would remember. As he lifted the camera, my father walked into the office and our attention was brought immediately to our superior’s presence. The doctor was given our deepest thanks and what was probably more money than would have been required before we left him staring after us in awe.

My fingers slid over the thin layer of glass that protected the aged picture that Stiles had scanned and did his best to restore. I was lost in a world of memories that were unimaginably comforting but simultaneously unbearably painful.

I was brought out of the bittersweet reverie by the familiar rumbling of a jeep’s engine. There were fresh tears on the cheeks of my reflection in the shimmering aluminum. I wiped away my tears quickly, placed the picture on top of the mantel, and pulled myself up towards the doorframe that separated the living room from the kitchen. As the jeep moved closer to my house, I did pull-ups until I was short of breath and there would be no questions about I might have appeared the way I did. I was still doing the pull-ups when Stiles skidded into my house, stopping dead in his tracks when he saw me drop from my perch.

He quickly got distracted when he discovered the picture on the mantel, a grin forming on his face. He walked to it, finding the wrapping paper and notes neatly resting next to the paper. His face was in shadows, and for the first time I realized that night had fallen. How long had I been standing there, staring at the picture and reliving every memory of my mother?

“So, I guess this means you aren’t going to kill me?” Stiles asked in a voice that was a little too happy to be asking that question.

“For finding out my birthday and putting the effort in to give me a present?” I asked curiously, my brow knitting together in confusion.

“Umm… I guess I didn’t think about it that way. I was thinking more along the lines of ‘How in God’s name did a teenager find a picture of my mother and know that he should give to me on the birthday that I never told him about in a stupid wolf picture frame that’s probably mocking the fact that I’m alone in the world and yeah – this kid needs to die.’ Something along those lines anyway. Seems like a pretty logical choice for a man that took pleasure in killing his uncle and-” Stiles was finally shut up when I lifted him off his feet and pinned him against the wall, growling deeply in the teenager’s ear. I held him with his face against the wall so that he wouldn’t wet himself when he realized that my eyes were glowing and I was already in the process of shifting.

“Who told you I enjoyed it? He was my uncle, Stiles. He would tell us stories to put us to sleep. Every time he came to visit, he would bring presents for us.” My voice was lower than natural and I could feel Stiles shivering in fear.

“Oh, God, Don’t kill me, okay? Dad needs me. You know. Sheriff of Beacon Hills Police Department?” He whimpered in fear. I pulled the rage back, forcing the wolf to calm down. Strangely, it actually seemed satisfied with the scare we had given the teenager.

Stiles turned, looking at me fearfully and inching a little closer towards the exit. “So… uh… Are you gonna kill me if I ask why you did it? I mean, if you will we can forget this ever came up, but it was Scott’s only chance at a-”

“Stiles, shut up and I might be willing to tell you.” I interrupted him, my eyes holding his gaze until he finally gave up and looked towards the ground, kicking at a little pile of ash.

We stood in silence for a few moments, Stiles fidgeting and me watching as I tried to compose my thoughts.

After a while, the silence grew to be too much for the hyperactive boy. “So, I should probably just…” He said, pointing towards the door and easing towards it slowly.

“Stiles.” His name was enough to stop him even with only a hint of anger in my voice. “What would Scott do if he killed an animal at the clinic?”

“Well, there was this one time when the vet office was really busy and there was this old mangy cat that needed to be put down so the vet asked him to do it. We ended up having a funeral after his shift. He was pretty traumatized.” Stiles answered, following where I was going. “So, you didn’t want him to have to live with the fact that he killed someone just to be human?”

I gave a nod, looking away. “I did it for myself too. He murdered my sister.”

He seemed to understand. At least, my answer gave him the confidence to come deeper into my house again and flop onto an old couch that had barely been touched by the fire. Dust flew everywhere and Stiles ended up spitting and flailing around to try to clear it away from him.

When it failed to work, he got to his feet and moved away from the couch, patting the dust away from the blazer he wore over his t-shirt. “Scott told you about the Christmas thing, right? Do you – did you celebrate Christmas? We could totally do like a werewolfnukkah celebration if that’s what you guys are into. Scott could learn his new culture and stuff.”

I let out a heavy sigh and rolled my eyes and Stiles shut up for a moment.

He rebounded with a grin, though. “What about the wolf moon? That’s totally a thing. The doctor I got the picture from told us about it. Why does the wolf moon matter anyway? Is it like the time when your great great ancestor slaughtered his son and tried feeding him to Zeus?”

My eyes flashed at Stiles and my growl caused him to jump back against a wall.

“Okay, look, can you not to that? Let’s make an agreement here. If I say something you think is wrong, we can talk about it before you start trying to literally bite my head off, okay? Deal?” He asked, holding his hands up in resignation.

“That’s a story, Stiles. Started and spread by humans that were afraid of us.” I said, crossing my arms over my chest.

“So… then you have a different story about that Lycaon guy?” He asked, his fear falling away as he was consumed by curiosity.

“Arcadia was names for Arcas, son of Callisto, who was Lycaon’s daughter and a lady-in-waiting to Artemis.” I began, knowing the story by heart. It had been a favorite of Uncle Peter’s.

“Goddess of the moon?” Stiles interjected, brown eyes wide and eager as curiosity came off him in waves.

“Goddess the hunt, the wilderness, and virginity as well.” I affirmed, diving back into the story. It was a relief to go back to the world of stories; the legends that no fire could take away from me the way it had the rest of my family. “Artemis was the chief deity of Lycaon’s family. They were celebrated hunters and loyal devotees to the goddess. But that brought jealousy from Zeus’ temple. The followers from that temple wanted to overthrow what they considered a heretical rule. One night, they stole Lycaon’s sons and grandsons and sacrificed them all in the name of Zeus.

“Lycaon, in his rage and sorrow, screamed to Artemis for help. Artemis heard him and took pity on her loyal follower. Lycaon’s cry turned into a howl underneath the glow of Artemis’ full moon as she granted him the power to hunt the men that slaughtered his family and avenge their deaths. With the temple of Zeus in ruins acting as the tomb to Zeus’ worshippers, Lycaon begged his mistress to put the pieces of his beloved family back together and breathe life back into them.

“She came to him, allowing the king to change back into his human form and cleaning his tears. She told Lycaon that his sons were too old. They had tasted the pleasures of the flesh and she could do nothing to save them. But Arcas was young and pure. Artemis promised that she would be able to revive Arcas if the king could bring all of his pieces and place them on the altar along with a goblet of the king’s blood before moonset. As the moon’s lips kissed the earth, the king placed the last pieces of his grandson as well as the goblet of blood onto the altar and they knitted themselves back together, the blood binding the pieces as though it were glue. Arcas gasped for breath, remembering nothing of what had happened. Artemis appeared to them one last time, warning them that she could not revoke the powers that she had given the king and that were passed to Arcas through his blood. She explained that gift would be given to their children and could be given to people they trusted but that the sanctity of the full moon under which the goddess gave the gift should never be forgotten.” I was surprised that I expressed the story so easily. It was the most I had spoken in such a short period of time since before the fire. Laura and I generally didn’t share the stories. They were painful memories of a time long passed. If it came up, it was when one of us forgot a detail and would ask the other about it so that we wouldn’t forget, but never did we discuss them at length.

“Wow.” Stiles said, looking up at me in shock. Sometime during the story he had taken a seat on the ground, staring up at me with the eagerness of a young schoolboy that hung on every word of the story. “You should tell stories more often. You’re freaking good at it. I should write that down. It’s not cool that you can find the other story everywhere but I’ve never seen that story. And I’ve read like ten different versions of it. We should totally team up and write a book. Werewolf Legends and Lore: Myths from their side. Sounds awesome, right?”

Stiles was so excited that I just shook my head in exasperation and offered him a hand to get him back on his feet. He stared at it for a few seconds before he cautiously accepted it and stood up.

“Crap!” He yelled, running outside and getting into his jeep. Leaping into it was a more appropriate wording. I stared in my confusion, my senses desperately scanning as far as they could reach for anything that might have scared Stiles. Had I shifted without realizing it? The fact that jeep was rocking as Stiles flailed around inside rather than speeding out of the woods seemed a good indicator that I hadn’t.

He came back into my house with a platter wrapped in aluminum foil, a pout on his face.

“It’s cold!” The teenager complained, his brown eyes looking at me in defeat.

Apparently the confusion on my face was enough for him to explain further. “Well, I figured since I missed your birthday and I was cooking for Dad today anyway and I thawed out too much meat for just the two of us that I’d bring you a plate of hot food since Dad had to head back to work not long after dinner anyway.”

I took the food from Stiles and carried it into the kitchen where I started removing the aluminum foil. Inside was a big chicken breast with the wing still attached with a helping of green beans and a big dollop of mashed potatoes.

“You cook?” I asked dubiously, wondering what place Stiles bought his meals from to fool his father.

“Well, whenever I’m not busy with school and practice and crazy werewolf drama, yeah. Someone has to make sure my dad eats right.” He answered, frowning at the way I was looking at his food.

I tore off the wing and took a bite of the cold meat, surprised that it was not only just edible, but that it was juicy and flavorful. He smiled, discerning from my face that I didn’t think it was disgusting.

“Ha!” He said, jabbing a finger into my ribs. “You like it! Admit it!”

Stiles jumped away from me and ran into the living room when I growled at him. When he realized I wasn’t giving chase, he stood in the doorway with a triumphant smile while his hands straightened the blazer on his shoulders.

“So, you’re coming, right? You have to get a gift for Allison – make it something good. She fought for you too, you know. Scott was the one that didn’t want you there. You have to bring something too. Scott already claimed drinks and cups. Seeing as how you don’t have a working kitchen, I think we can forgive you if it’s something lame like napkins or store-bought cookies. See you in a few days!”

I was left with a very distinct urge to slam my head into the wall. Somehow, I felt that I had doomed myself. Fate was cruel. I was going to be punished by living. Living a life filled with McCall angst, betas trying to stupidly date Hunter’s daughters that I was forced to shower with gifts, and a lot of awkward flailing and constant noise.


End file.
